Macron counts on Saudi prince to ‘mitigate’ fallout from Ukraine war

French leader Emmanuel Macron and Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Salman agreed to work to mitigate “the effects” of the Ukraine war, Macron’s office said on Friday after talks in Paris that include the Saudi leader’s full diplomatic rehabilitation marked.

Like US President Joe Biden, who visited Riyadh earlier this month, Macron was keen to secure additional oil production from the de facto Saudi leader, who has recently been a pariah in the West.

A French statement made no reference to an agreement, but said the two men had agreed to “intensify their cooperation to mitigate the impact (of the war) in Europe, the Middle East and the world.”

The dinner between the two men on Thursday night outraged rights groups over Bin Salman’s alleged role in the 2018 killing of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

Western leaders snubbed the 36-year-old prince after Saudi agents killed Khashoggi at the Saudi Arabian consulate in Istanbul in 2018.

But the prince is being courted again as Europe and its allies desperately seek new sources of fossil fuels to replace lost Russian production.

Upon departing on Friday, bin Salman expressed his “deepest gratitude and appreciation for the warm welcome and hospitality bestowed on me and the accompanying delegation,” in a statement posted online by the Saudi Foreign Ministry.

Macron’s decision to host the controversial king drew fierce criticism at home from human rights groups and left-wing opponents.

While Biden bin Salman bumped his fist upon his arrival in Riyadh, Macron shook hands on the steps of the Elysee Palace as he greeted the prince.

“He’s been shaking hands with a man whose hands are covered in blood for a long time,” senior left MP Alexis Corbiere told BFM television on Friday.

As defense minister, bin Salman oversaw Saudi Arabia’s military intervention in Yemen in 2015 against the Iran-backed Houthi rebels who took control of the capital, Sana’a.

Allies of the French president defended a meeting widely presented as a case study in “Realpolitik” – placing practical considerations above foreign policy principles.

Analysts say Saudi Arabia is one of the few countries in the world capable of increasing its oil production, although its room for maneuver is seen as limited.

“There are partners, countries that do not all share the same democratic values ​​as France,” Public Services Minister Stanislas Guerini, a close ally of the president, told Radio Europe 1.

“But I think it would be a mistake not to speak up, not try to make things happen,” he added.

The president’s role is to “protect the French people,” he said.

“French values, the voice of France, human rights, as always, were carried by the President last night,” he added.

Amnesty International director Agnes Callamard told AFP that she was “deeply disturbed by the visit”.

The killing of Khashoggi was described by a UN inquiry as an “extrajudicial killing blamed on Saudi Arabia”.

US intelligence found that the Crown Prince had “approved” the operation that led to Khashoggi’s death.

Riyadh denies this, blaming rogue agents for it.

“I am outraged and outraged that Emmanuel Macron is receiving my fiancé Jamal Khashoggi’s executioner with all honor,” his fiancee Hatice Cengiz told AFP on Thursday.

The French President first hosted bin Salman in 2018 when Macron took him to an art exhibition at the Louvre, and traveled to the kingdom for further talks in December 2021.

The Saudi strongman stayed at his Louis XIV chateau in Louveciennes, west of Paris, which he bought in 2015, according to a source who asked not to be named.

Despite its name, the castle was only built in 2009 by a company led by Khashoggi’s cousin Emad, and was described as “the most expensive house in the world” at the time of purchase.